Sea Shanty Friday

December 20, 2024 by Adam in Family

I've been playing around with AI music generation with Suno, making songs for my D&D campaign.  After some fiddling around I managed to get Copilot to write the lyrics which I moved into Suno and told it to make a sea shanty.  The result is an absolute banger that nicely touches on the campaign's themes and is quickly getting stuck in my head.  It's wild how much things feel like they've started to change in technology.  I never would have predicted that the future is populated with AI generated sea shanties.

The last of the boxes in the kitchen has gone and we now have a dishwasher that doesn't require complex button pushes to bypass the safety checks.  All of our appliances are now the apparently popular black and chrome and all but the refrigerator talk to the Internet.  Now Jo occasionally lets me know when the dishes are done or the oven is done heating up.  The next grand project is replacing our old electrical box, which is more expensive than expected but hopefully prepares us better for future projects.

The rest of the week is going along well.  Emma stopped by for a visit yesterday and a trip to the library.  Jo and I went out for burgers at Plank Town in Springfield then off to a Christmas musical at the nearby Wildish theater.  It's nice having older kids when stepping away for a couple hours is relatively easy.

As for the weekend, tomorrow we've got to decorate the tree and I've got presents to wrap.  Sunday is D&D with friends.  Best of all it's the start of two weeks off work, the first long vacation since August.  I'm really excited.

The Kitchen Tower Shrinks

December 17, 2024 by Adam in Family

The once immense tower of appliances in the kitchen shrunk slightly on Sunday as Jo and I installed the new microwave.  It was the usual somewhat frustrating affair, dealing with weird cabinets and having to drill some of the holes a couple of times.  Still, we got it setup in the end and declared success, somewhat exhausted.

I'm still getting used to the new microwave - for example, it doesn't rotate the tray when you open the door like our weird old one did.  The first time I heated up tea I moved my hand to where I predicted it would be, then had to adjust to the now stationary tea.  It also plays a jaunty tune when finished heating, which may get old.  Maybe the microwave has ringtones like the 1990's cell phones.

Duncan's sweetie returns to Florida today.  Emma comes back from the beach.  Yvonne still has school.  Jo has an event tonight.  We've yet to put up a Christmas tree or wrap our remaining presents.  Jo and I are seeing a play at the Wildish Theater on Thursday after dinner somewhere in Springfield.  It's fun feeling fancy and going out on the town.

Rainy Mocha Friday

December 13, 2024 by Adam in Family

We've entered the dreary season  - not particularly cold but quite soggy and gloomy.  I continue to break out the bright lights, cozy fireplace and warm beverages in response.  The kitties lead by example.

Getting the microwave and dishwasher installed was unsuccessful - they'd only install a microwave on a dedicated circuit and the dishwasher didn't have the required plug. One day our kitchen won't have a tower of boxes, but not this week.

It's been a generally pleasant week - Duncan and Emma are off of school, Duncan's been hanging out with his sweetie who's visiting, Emma's off to the beach with her mom, Jo's busy with end-of-year things at work, and I'm wrapping up my big work project and hopefully moving on to the next one soon.  After next week I have two weeks off, which I'm very much looking forward to.

I've got a long to-do list for this weekend - moving a cabinet door over an inch to better fit the new oven, finishing reapolstering the last of the chairs, wrapping christmas presents, putting up lights, and a bunch of other little things.  I suspect I'll manage some fun in there too - I'm enjoying the new Indiana Jones game, currently looting the secrets of the Vatican and punching nazis.  Good times.

Dungeons and Dragons and Colds

December 09, 2024 by Adam in Family

Saturday was the great witch fight with the family group.  It's hard calling the party's action a success - they saved most of the children and heisted the painting they were sent to steal, but two of the party were knocked unconscious and Emma's character came the closest to death I've seen.  Fortunately a lucky roll turned the tide and they lived to fight again another day.  Hopefully next session goes a little more smoothly.

Duncan's sweetie arrived from the airport and he's been in an understandably cheerful mood.  Yvonne, Emma and I went to the library and returned with a good haul.  Jo arranged for the rest of the appliances to be installed this Wednesday, so I'm off the hook there.

Saturday afternoon I started feeling under the weather and I was pretty wiped out on Sunday.  I mostly hung out on the couch while Emma entertained me.  Advil and coffee helped, as did a brief nap, and fortunately I'm feeling much better today.

I've got some bugs to fix at work and a long list of cleanup tasks, but things are generally coming along nicely.  I started the new Indiana Jones video game, which is nostalgic and entertaining so far.  Christmas is sneaking up on all of us - we'll probably get a tree soon and Emma helped me wrap some of the presents this weekend.  Having some time off work and hanging out with the family seems really nice.

Boxes, Boxes, Boxes

December 06, 2024 by Adam in Family

It was the week where four appliances were replaced - dryer, stove, microwave and dishwasher.  They installed the dryer and stove, if incompletely, but the other two are stacked in the kitchen waiting to be installed.  I suspect that duty will fall to me, perhaps with Emma's assistance for the dishwasher. 

The stove is an induction stove, using magnetic fields to heat up ferrous metal pans.  I used it for the first time last night and think I generally like it.  Things heat up really fast, which is different.  I had water boiling incredibly quickly and had to readjust my cooking schedule.  Since I'd never used one before I started reading the warnings.  It turns out we're not supposed to dry our pets in the oven, nor have children crawl in there.  Scratch that off my list.

The other boxes filling the house are the steady stream of Christmas presents.  I guess I need to actually wrap them one of these days. Hopefully that makes me feel like less of a horder as I've filled my closet and overflowed into my bedroom.

Some of the weeks' stressors are clearing up.  My work projects are getting sorted out nicely.  The internet seems to be behaving better after days of intermittent failures which kicked me out of work meetings.  Best of all it's Friday with my mocha half-full beside me.  Maybe I'll survive until spring.

Chill(y) Weekend

December 02, 2024 by Adam in Family

It was a generally pleasant weekend of trying to stay cozy as the weather cools.  I'm not sure I did anything too important on Saturday - read some graphic novels from the library, play some games, and paint some minis.  It was so nice to have four days off of work and do nothing too important.

Sunday was D&D with the friend group.  The ship they had since the beginning was upgraded to fly through space, so they ended up exploring part of their solar system.  Plus I got to break out some new minis to show off.  It was also one of those downtime sessions where they shopped and defended their little seaside town against the dangers of the world, which I think was a fun change from the usual pace.

Now I'm back at work, shepherding code through stages of approval and release.  A few pipelines are misbehaving still, but I think I'm generally making progress.  It looks like my coworkers are taking a couple weeks off in December, so I'll probably follow suit, making it the longest I've had off in ages.  Should be nice!

Thanksgiving Mocha Friday

November 29, 2024 by Adam in Family

It's been a generally good week.  I've made progress at work as well as being thwarted by failing pipelines as I try to follow all the recommended procedures.  I spent half a day doing my Connect, writing good things about myself and what awesome things I plan on doing in the future.  Hopefully it turned out okay.

Thanksgiving was great, from waking up lazily to play video games, make myself blueberry pancakes and a mocha, paint some minis, help a little with cooking, then wander off to mom's for a low-key get together with family.  Francis and her stories were constantly entertaining.  Robbie's beard was majestic.  The food was delicious, especially the two pieces of pumpkin pie throughout the day.

I've got three more days of kicking it.  Emma's coming over sometime and I'm sure we'll make a library run.  I've got D&D with the friend group this Sunday.  I started a pencil-and-paper solo Call of Cthulu RPG  and might work more on that - I'm currently on a steam ship to Athens with the mystery beginning to be discovered.  More and more it feels like it's the time of year to turn on the fireplace, pour a cup of tea, and do cozy things until springtime.

Witches and Super Spies

November 29, 2024 by Adam in Adam's Games

My new job came with an XBox Game Pass, so I've been digging into some of the free games that come with that, along with some of the Steam games I pick up along the way.  I've recently dabbled in Starcraft, Goat Simulator, Aliens Dark Descent, and more, but it's hard finding time to get all the way through a game.

Yesterday I finished playing Black Ops 6, which ended up being a high-quality spy shooter that felt like I was playing an over-the-top Mission Impossible movie.  Yes there were motorcycle jumps and casino infiltration levels, but it was a short and entertaining experience.

On the other end of the spectrum was The Cosmic Wheel Sisterhood, which was a Spanish-made magical realism game about witches, fate, and friendship.  It was almost an interesting Rorchart test of who you are - I ended up sacrificing my immortality for saving the universe and my friends.  Seemed a good trade.

Mushroom Hunting Weekend

November 25, 2024 by Adam in Family

I had wanted a low-key weekend and generally got what I wanted.  I was a little under the weather Saturday but Emma and I managed to make our weekly library pilgrimage and hit up The House of Records afterwards for Christmas presents.  I managed to finish the first volume of a graphic novel collection - Gideon Falls ended up being a sci-fi horror dimension hopping story and right up my alley.  I also worked on some little web application side thing making planets appear in the browser for my D&D game.  It's satisfying turning ideas into code in a short period of time, unlikely my real job which moves at a glacial pace at times.

Sunday started with a hearty breakfast of hash browns, eggs, bacon, veggie sausage and french toast, ending with sipping a mocha with Data on my lap demanding pets.  I had more energy that day and did a bit of basement cleanup and tried to fix the coffee table down there a little.  Eventually Emma and I went on a final mushroom hunt for her mycology class, scouring Hendrick's Park for anything interesting.  We found a couple and upon returning home Victoria across the street found more for us, but alas it looks like none of them expanded Emma's collection in the right way.  I think it's like Pokemon Go.

I'm back at work, really hoping to get my big PR wrapped up soon so I can move on to the next thing.  I've also got the new Alien movie to watch as I run at lunch - scifi horror really helps me get my pace up.

It lives!

November 22, 2024 by Adam in Family

I've sorted things out with Hunter Communication and my web site should be on the Internet again.  They made a change on their end to save some money (going from NAT to CGNAT), so apparently I needed to make grumpy noises before they switched me back.  Duncan was needed to do some Minecraft server things for a video, so he should be happy too.